Visnovsky Being Held Out of Today’s HC Slovan Game By KHL

January 15th, 20131:30 pm

Kevin Schultz

Earlier this morning there were reports on twitter from our counterparts across the ocean that the KHL would hold Lubomir Visnovsky out until some sort of an agreement was reached between the NHL and KHL. Apparently, after all the talk and bluster from the KHL, they weren’t ready to die on Visnovsky Hill quite yet (or maybe Bill Daly has taken all the hills).

Chris Johnston of Sportsnet report that the KHL asked the NHL for permission to allow Visnovsky to play with Slovan, but as of that point the KHL hasn’t recieved a response. The Islanders and the NHL will certainly not allow Visnovsky to play for Slovan, so the issue is whether the two parties on opposite sides of the ocean can come to some kind of agreement.

It’s always been possible that Visnovsky could be part of some larger KHL plan to keep Datsyuk, Kovalchuk, Ovechkin or other big names in Europe but once those names all returned to North America it didn’t seem likely the league would hold a hard line with Visnovsky. This thing is far from settled, but it appears the KHL is going to hold Visnovsky out and discuss the matter with the NHL.